


Of the Litter

by Missy



Category: Pet Sematary - Stephen King
Genre: Detectives, Evil Pets, Future Fic, Gen, Ghosts, Imaginary Friends, Psychics, The Care and Feeding of Undead Pets, Trick or Treat: Treat, came back wrong, wryness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-13 02:29:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21236663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missy/pseuds/Missy
Summary: When Ellie picked Church out, she had no idea she was committing to a lifetime of caring for a very angry, very undead cat who would happily kill anyone that wronged her.Her very gruesome imaginary childhood friend Victor is amused.Somehow, the three of them solve crimes together.





	Of the Litter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hearthouses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hearthouses/gifts).

When Ellie picked Church out, he’d been a scrappy-looking Tom kitten. Even then he’d only loved her, only spared a thought for her, something her parents had worried about when Gage grew old enough to toddle about the room. 

Church had never liked Gage, even the Other Gage that had apparently existed outside of Ellie’s experience, outside of her line of sight. He had apparently been found wandering the family property the night her brother had died again and her parents had joined him.

“Be glad you don’t have those memories,” said Pascow. She was used to his gruesome visage, looming gravely over her. Offering advice at the strangest of times instead of scolding her; honestly, keeping her alive. Pascow was made of solid advice and good ideas for most of the time.

His notions about Church were less than supportive.

“They should have left him where they found him,” he said. “Chruch was reborn in a foul place. He hasn’t been himself in years, and he never will be himself again.”

“I know,” Ellie said, but she could never talk herself into putting the cat down. After all, there were advantages to having a cat touched by death.

It could touch the dead in turn.

*** 

Church still smelled awful. That was a fact of having an undead, slightly morbid cat in one’s life. Ellie’s reasonable reaction to that had been to figure out a regimen of cat bathing that kept him reasonably tolerable-smelling enough not to alert her landlord when she was out on a case. No one else – not even Pascow – could properly hold and tame Church.

“You’re a ghost,” she pointed out. “Bathing cats isn’t n your resume.”

He shook his head at her (completely correct, thank you) assessment. At least she could clean up Church. For Pascow she could do nothing, his head wound forever gaping open.

*** 

Ellie knew she had a gift when she was very young. Perhaps before Victor came to her, but definitely afterward. The rest of what drove her to take up the battle for justice felt oblique – perhaps a need for fairness, to take back from the universe what it took from her.

Either way, she was the best criminal pathologist they had. Though they didn’t know about her ability to see into the past – or her ghost best friend’s ability to know exactly what was going on and why.

Ellie enjoyed her alone time, otherwise – with Church, in her favorite Chinese joint, or when out and about. 

Pascow scolded her about her lack of a mate. “Don’t let the world warp you,” he warned her. “Don’t choose to be alone when you can have the world.”

She laughed and cut the cards. “Your hand,” she said, as he sighed and sat down at the table. Church eyed him suspiciously from across the room, but made no move to hurt him.

And together they settled in for the night. All in all, Ellie decided, as she beat Pascow again and he resented his lack of luck with cards, it was better than playing solitaire.


End file.
